Holy Water Disposal

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If your personal holy water font becomes dirty is it OK to dump it outside into the ground? I know church’s have a special drainage sink that goes directly into the ground so it doesn’t mix with the sewage.
 
juicekman said:
If your personal holy water font becomes dirty is it OK to dump it outside into the ground? I know church’s have a special drainage sink that goes directly into the ground so it doesn’t mix with the sewage.
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You can dispose of it by pouring it into the ground after choosing a place where people or animals do not walk over it.
 
Just this morning I saw my priest refilling the small holy water bottle he uses when we bring sacramentals for blessing, or when he blesses us. He poured from his 2 litre bottle into the little one over the pot plant in his office. BTW its one of the healthiest looking pot plants I’ve seen outside of a nursery or flower shop 😉 😃
 
juicekman said:
If your personal holy water font becomes dirty is it OK to dump it outside into the ground? I know church’s have a special drainage sink that goes directly into the ground so it doesn’t mix with the sewage.
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holy water does not need to be poured into the sacrarium, the special sink in the sacristy, only water used to cleanse the vessels. just pour it on God’s good earth, in a garden bed is best or under a tree. a pinch of salt keeps the water fresh longer and keeps your font from getting green. and yes a potted (real) plant would be okay too. bet it works better than miracle gro
 
Jsmith17 said:
I do hope you mean potted plant.
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Oops, where I come from “pot plant” means what you call “potted plant” (what you call pot, we would call dagga) - be sure my priest is not cultivating any illegal substances in his office. 😃
 
VivienneJ said:
Oops, where I come from “pot plant” means what you call “potted plant” (what you call pot, we would call dagga) - be sure my priest is not cultivating any illegal substances in his office. 😃
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:rotfl: I missed that first time around.

I can just see a priest throwing around words like “spliff” and “hooka” in the church office.😃
 
Newbie2 said:
:rotfl: I missed that first time around.

I can just see a priest throwing around words like “spliff” and “hooka” in the church office.😃
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Oops, I think I contributed big time to this thread being derailed. :sad_yes:

On a serious note, out here we’re allowed to worship as Catholics, but alcohol and drugs are very forbidden :bigyikes: - wow that could be bad - I’m 😊
 
DJgang said:
It’s all in fun Viv! 😉 Don’t be 😊 !

God bless! Dana
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S’ok, I do realize and see the funny side.

Shows how words mean different things in different places and it can be extremely funny. Next time I go into Father’s office I will probably start laughing when I see the potted plant!!
 
I was taught by our altar society sacristan that we pour any holy water that is contaminated into the earth, into the sacrarium, into the plants that decorate our altars, etc. We do this each week before we clean the fonts and refill them. In fact, it is my understanding that any blessed sacramental can be disposed of respectfully if necessary by returning it to the earth. When we wash the altar linens or the priests’ vestments we rinse them in a tub two or three times and pour that water off into the earth just in case any of the Precious Blood or a crumb of the Sacred Host is on them. THEN we put them in the washing machine. I guess the one exception to this is prayer petitions, etc. written on paper. When we need to dispose of those, we burn them and then spread the ashes onto the ground.

I think I will be laughing quite a while about the pot plant in the priest’s office myself, Viv! Very funny!
 
VivienneJ said:
S’ok, I do realize and see the funny side.

Shows how words mean different things in different places and it can be extremely funny. Next time I go into Father’s office I will probably start laughing when I see the potted plant!!
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Yeah, now just try to forget about this discussion. LOL You’ll think about it EVERY time you see the “pot” plant. 😃
 
juicekman said:
If your personal holy water font becomes dirty is it OK to dump it outside into the ground? I know church’s have a special drainage sink that goes directly into the ground so it doesn’t mix with the sewage.
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This was actually covered in this week’s RCIA class.

Right next to the regular sink in the sacristy, there’s a place where holy water and remaining precious blood is poured and goes to the ground under the church.
 
George_C said:
This was actually covered in this week’s RCIA class.

Right next to the regular sink in the sacristy, there’s a place where holy water and remaining precious blood is poured and goes to the ground under the church.
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Gasp!
No, the Precious Blood is NEVER poured down the Sacrarium (the special sink).
Please say that they didn’t tell you that. Please, oh please say that’s not what they told you.

Someone who does that incurs an automatic excommunication, and lifting this is reserved to the Holy See.
 
FrDavid96 said:
Gasp!
No, the Precious Blood is NEVER poured down the Sacrarium (the special sink).
Please say that they didn’t tell you that. Please, oh please say that’s not what they told you.

Someone who does that incurs an automatic excommunication, and lifting this is reserved to the Holy See.
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FrDavid, your response reminded me of something horrible that happened about 30 years ago. Although I’m only a new Catholic, I grew up Anglican (Episcopalian? Church of England?) and anyway, deep in my heart I knew that once blessed that was no longer round wafers and wine served at the Eucharist.

However my husband belonged to a very different denomination. One evening we had one of the priests and some other folk from his church over for coffee, they wanted to start the evening with ‘bread breaking’, all well and good (I was then Anglican remember). Afterwards I served coffee and cake, we all had a good chat and they went home. I tidied up and opened my kitchen rubbish bin (garbage disposal) to throw something away, and nearly died of fright :bigyikes: The remaining crackers they had used were in my rubbish bin! My transsubstantiation trained brain and heart were horrified to find they had just chucked Jesus into my rubbish bin, along with old tea bags and other kitchen waste.

Truly I wanted to run to my husband for advice / and to pick out every piece of precious cracker / and put that bin in some dark corner where I could ignore the whole horrible situation. Fortunately common sense returned (the Holy Spirit took pity on me) and I realised that these bits were just crackers still and therefore I supposed it was okay to dispose of them that way, although I was still very disturbed and felt the remaining crackers should have been eaten.
 
FrDavid96 said:
Gasp!
No, the Precious Blood is NEVER poured down the Sacrarium (the special sink).
Please say that they didn’t tell you that. Please, oh please say that’s not what they told you.
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I think that’s what the RCIA instructor said. I know he said holy water.

It’s a pain being hearing impaired. Even though my hearing loss is comparatively mild, I do have tinnitus in my right ear and that’s the one with most of the hearing loss.

Plus I was going on something like three hours sleep. :eek:

I’ll ask for a clarification this Sunday.
FrDavid96 said:
Someone who does that incurs an automatic excommunication, and lifting this is reserved to the Holy See.
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I understand. Maybe I misunderstood the guy. It wouldn’t be the first time I misunderstood someone.
 
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